Acute (medicine)

In medicine, acute describes a disease of recent onset and potentially short duration, with the specific meaning of short and recent varying by disease and context. Acute is used in contrast to chronic, which describes long lasting conditions, as in the distinction between acute and chronic leukaemia. The term also appears in the names of specific conditions to mark a sudden or short course, such as severe acute respiratory syndrome, acute myocardial infarction and acute hepatitis, and it can also describe minor everyday injuries and common infections that typically resolve within days or weeks.